Things that My Heart Fails to Tell
Shoham Smith’s first book is a collection of very brief stories, postmodernist, colorful and as rhythmic as video-clips. Her fluent, witty style recalls that of Orly Castel-Bloom, but hers is a distinctive world. Her stories depict encounters between reality and absurdity. Thus a common situation in an office turns into a fantastic campaign of vengeance, when a frustrated secretary uses the copying machine to enlarge herself into a giant and reduce her boss to the size of a pencil. All the stories reflect the modernity and alienation of the 1990s, and the characters are uninhibited contemporary young men and women. The humor and the verbal style also reflect this liberation.
-
“In addition to the distinctive humor and command of the language, there is Smith's abundant imagination. The book is rich in voices, tales and different worlds, and it is highly colorful. ”
-
“ Shoham Smith's linguistic freedom is marvellous.”
-
“ Smith knows how to listen and submit to the language, to herself, to her environment, and especially to the relations between the three.”